U.S. coal mining deaths: 1900-2019

Here are the number of coal mining deaths in the United States, from 1900 through 2019.

The average annual coal mining fatalities in the United States the past decade has fallen by approximately 60% starting in the 1990s. It has dropped nearly 43% from the 2000s.

China's coal mining deaths

For a quick comparison, let’s look at China’s coal-mining death toll vs the United States over a span of 10+ years:

The data on deaths per 200,000 hours of work for Chinese miners is not available. However, the data on deaths per 1 million tons of coal shows that Chinese miners die at a rate approximately 20 times that of the USA death rate. Chinese fatality rates have been declining beginning in 2003. However, their rates remain extremely high when compared to the United States.

For example, when comparing 2007:

China had a death rate of 1.485 deaths per 1 million tons of coal.
United States had a death rate of 0.04 per 1 million tons of coal.

Let’s look at 2009:

China had a death rate of 0.849 deaths per 1 million tons of coal.
United States had a death rate of 0.02 per 1 million tons of coal.

U.S. coal mining death charts: 1900-2019

Year	Total Miners	Miner Deaths
1900	448,581	1,489
1901	485,544	1,574
1902	518,197	1,724
1903	566,260	1,926
1904	593,693	1,995
1905	626,045	2,232
1906	640,780	2,138
1907	680,492	3,242
1908	690,438	2,445
1909	666,552	2,642
1910	725,030	2,821
1911	728,348	2,656
1912	722,662	2,419
1913	747,644	2,785
1914	763,185	2,454
1915	734,008	2,269
1916	720,971	2,226
1917	757,317	2,696
1918	762,426	2,580
1919	776,569	2,323
1920	784,621	2,272
1921	823,253	1,995
1922	844,807	1,984
1923	862,536	2,462
1924	779,613	2,402
1925	748,805	2,518
1926	759,033	2,234
1927	759,177	2,231
1928	682,831	2,176
1929	654,494	2,187
1930	644,006	2,063
1931	589,705	1,463
1932	527,623	1,207
1933	523,182	1,064
1934	566,426	1,226
1935	565,202	1,242
1936	584,582	1,342
1937	589,856	1,413
1938	541,528	1,105
1939	539,375	1,078
1940	533,267	1,388
1941	546,692	1,266
1942	530,861	1,471
1943	486,516	1,451
1944	453,937	1,298
1945	437,921	1,068
1946	463,079	968
1947	490,356	1,158
1948	507,333	999
1949	485,306	585
1950	483,239	643
1951	441,905	785
1952	401,329	548
1953	351,126	461
1954	283,705	396
1955	260,089	420
1956	260,285	448
1957	254,725	478
1958	224,890	358
1959	203,597	293
1960	189,679	325
1961	167,568	294
1962	161,286	289
1963	157,126	284
1964	150,761	242
1965	148,734	259
1966	145,244	233
1967	139,312	222
1968	134,467	311
1969	133,302	203
1970	144,480	260
1971	142,108	181
1972	162,207	156
1973	151,892	132
1974	182,274	133
1975	224,412	155
1976	221,255	141
1977	237,506	139
1978	255,588	106
1979	260,429	144
1980	253,007	133
1981	249,738	153
1982	241,454	122
1983	200,199	70
1984	208,160	125
1985	197,049	68
1986	185,167	89
1987	172,780	63
1988	166,278	53
1989	164,929	68
1990	168,625	66
1991	158,677	61
1992	153,128	55
1993	141,183	47
1994	143,645	45
1995	132,111	47
1996	126,451	39
1997	126,429	30
1998	122,083	29
1999	114,489	35
2000	108,098	38
2001	114,458	42
2002	110,966	28
2003	104,824	30
2004	108,734	28
2005	116,436	23
2006	122,975	47
2007	122,936	34
2008	133,828	30
2009	134,089	18
2010	135,500	48
2011	143,437	20
2012	137,650	20
2013	123,259	20
2014	116,010	16
2015	102,804	12
2016	81,485	8
2017	82,843	15
2018	82,699	12
2019	81,361	12

China mining death charts: 1900-2019

Year	Chinese Miner Deaths
2000	5,300
2001	5,670
2002	5791
2003	7200
2004	6027
2005	5986
2006	4746
2007	3786
2008	3215
2009	2631
2010	2433
2011	1760

Resources & References

S&P Global Market Intelligence

Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA)

Death Data and Statistics

Looking for more statistics? Don’t miss this resource.

U.S. coal mining deaths: 1900-2019